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Lieut James Bell SALMOND, 7th Black Watch - WW1 Poet

Lieut James Bell SALMOND , 7th Black Watch served in WW1 with this Fife Battalion although he was born in Arbroath and he and his cousin, Lieut Patrick Wright Anderson , 8th black Watch , 10 Black Watch and 18 Sqn RAF were awarded the Dux medals at the Arbroath High school. JB Salmond won the English Medal that took him first to the University College Dundee and then onto St Andrews University and then to London to work as a Journalist and his cousin Lt P W Anderson won the Dux medal at the same school for Science and then went onto the University College Dundee and he was a corporal in the St Andrews Uni OTC when war broke out and he was commissioned from the OTC to the 8th Bn Black watch .

Lieutenant J B Salmond wrote several War Poems such as the Poppies and the Forfar Bus and I thought you readers may like the Forfar Bus :

On the Forfar 'bus in a morn of spring ,
A nipping wind and the frost's sharp sting ;
And I can't tell why, but you want to sing
If your heart's like the heart o 'me .
The folks in the 'bus, they stretch their legs ,
And talk of the fall in the price of eggs,
Of mile by the pint, and butter in kegs,
With "Drop in some day to your tea ".

And my mind goes back to the days that were
Days of turmoil and days of stir,
And a 'bus from Albert to Pozieres,
And fellows that rode with me.
We cursed the night , and we cursed the wet ;
We envied the luck of the men we met
Coming out of the trenches at Courcelette
A deuce of a place to be .

The Forfar 'bus brought me back once more
As the clock a the Pillars was striking four ;
Though the wind may blow and the rain may pour ,
There's a chair and a fire for me .
But the lads that jumped off at the duckboard track -
(Cold was the night , and heavy the pack )
They didn't join on when the 'bus went back-
And they'll never come in for their tea .

J B Salmond , Lieutenant The Black Watch

Lieut J B Salmond after the war decided not to return to London but worked with DC Thomson in Dundee and then was appointed the Editor of the Scots Magazine for many years . That magazine reported the Battle of Culloden in 1746 even ! J B Salmond's cousin Lieut P W Anderson served in France and Salonika with the 10th Black Watch and then in France serving with the 18 Sqn RFC (RAF ) from November 1917 but sadly on 27th June 1918 he his DH4 day time bomber was attacked by 10 EA over Flanders and thankfully his Canadian Pilot got them back to their lines and a CCS at Aire on the Somme and on 11 November 1919 Lieut Anderson arrived back in Arbroath on an Ambulance Train to dress his wounds daily but he died of these wounds on 2nd November 1921 and he was buried in the Western Cemetery at Arbroath (compartment D).

You will know that Lieut J B Salmond served in action in France and was hospitalised at the Craiglockhart War Hospital in Edinburgh for a short time and during the time there he was the war hospital magazine editor and his sub editor 2nd Lt Wilfred Owen and some of the articles were submitted by Capt. Siegfried Sassoon MC . Lt Salmond returned the his Regiment in France and Lieut Owen took the editor's chair and then he too was back at the front but days before the Armistice he was killed in action .

sorry folks yes pats corner ceased years ago now here as I was not able to do my own researches and casualties of war researches that have been missed off rolls of honour etc . They say once a Bobby always a Bobby and I get told about headstones or roll of honour books for colleges etc and I find casualties not listed on CWGC or and SNWM etc